The Simpsons of Evergreen Terrace
by KeepingUpDisappearances
Summary: Three stories from Homer, Bart and Lisa. [updated].
1. Homer the Tetris

One Saturday afternoon, Homer Simpson was sitting listlessly on the red couch in the Simpsons' living room. For the first time in many years, he was bored on a Saturday. Lard Lad donuts was closed for several weeks due to a cockroach infestation, Moe was on vacation (thus Moe's was closed) and Lenny and Carl were at lunch. On their first date. A few days before, Carl had admitted to Lenny he was attracted to him, and Lenny had confessed that he was attracted to Carl!

"Stupid we're-suddenly-gay Lenny and Carl," Homer muttered. "Having fun without me."

Eventually Homer turned on the TV and flipped mindlessly through the channels. There was nothing on TV, either. Saturday afternoon was just a conglomeration of reruns and advertising shows. Homer threw the remote control at the TV just as Marge wandered into the living room.

"What's wrong, Homey?" she asked. "Why are you taking your anger out on the television? Again."

"Lenny and Carl are on a date," Homer complained, "and Moe's is closed, and I can't get any _real_ donuts. Why did the Lard Lad close because of a few cockroaches? My Saturday is ruined!"

"Err…I believe the health inspector found the cockroaches all over—in cupboards, drawers, bags of flour…" Marge's voice trailed off.

"I'm bored!" Homer complained.

"Well, duh!" Marge grumbled, and suggested, "You could do some work around the house. I'd really like that hole in the kitchen wall fixed. I keep shooing snakes out of the house."

"No," Homer mumbled. "I'll do the work tomorrow," he promised—with a sincerity that was unusual for him. "Work will only make the day _more_ boring."

"Why don't you play Tetris on the computer? I ran across it while helping Lisa research games made by Atari. She's writing a paper about advances in electronic games."

"I'm not much when it comes to education," Homer suddenly interjected, "but isn't that kind of useless, writing about video games? What does it teach the children? Oh, won't someboy _please_ think of the children!"

Marge laughed. "It's really no different from writing about a bunch of dead philosophers who lived a long time ago, or how the Murdoch scandal affects California."

Homer sighed. "I guess I'll try that Tetris you're talking about."

After much effort, Homer finally learned the basics of Tetris. And he was soon sitting stiffly upright and pressing the arrow keys as if his life depended on it. Even when Marge started preparing dinner, he was still at the game, turning T-blocks, straight blocks, L-blocks as fast as he could. He wasn't very precise, but he moved fast. He stared at the monitor screen without blinking, period.

More than once, as Marge prepared double-fried chicken, cheese-drenched potatoes, and a salad covered with cheese dressing, she heard Homer all the way from the living room.

"Stupid blocks! Damn you! Why won't you fit! Change shapes, dammit! Arrg! I almost had a Tetris! DAMN YOU BLOCKS! DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL!"

Marge rolled her eyes and stuck the potatoes into the oven to bake. Twenty minutes later, she brought out the crackling, hot chicken and the steaming potatoes.

"Kids! Homer!" she called, "get it while it's dangerously hot!"

Bart rushed into the kitchen. Lisa followed more slowly, and looked confusedly around at the dinner that was laid out.

"Didn't you get my tofu burgers, Mom?"

"Oh, Lisa, I forgot."

"Oh, so now I have to open the box, put it in the microwave for two minutes, and take it out all by myself? What kind of service is that?" Lisa teased her mom. Marge laughed and then folded her hands in prayer.

"All right, kids, Homer, let's pray!" Marge declared.

"Uh, Dad's not here," Bart informed his mother and oldest sister.

"That's unusual," Marge said in confusion.

"GAME OVER? THE HELL IT ISN'T! LISTEN TO ME, YOU FRIGGING COMPUTER! I'M GOING TO WIN AND—YEAH, GIVE ME A LOW SCORE! SEE IF I CARE!"

"I think Dad's still playing Tetris," Lisa said bluntly.

Marge sighed. "Lis, it's your turn to tear him away from the latest thing he's obsessed with."

Lisa strode into the living room and stopped by the computer. Homer was staring straight at the screen and playing Tetris; the only part of him that moved was his right hand. The arrow keys clicked frantically as Homer frantically turned the pieces to fit. He did not notice Lisa at the desk.

"Try again my ass! You fu-,"

Lisa coughed, and Homer jumped as he turned around.

"It's dinner, Dad! You guys are having extremely overfried chicken and potatoes soaked in cheese!"

"Can't stop, must start another game. Must get to Level Five," Homer replied in a robotic voice.

"Uh, Dad, if you look at the screen any longer, you might have vision problems."

Homer laughed. "Aren't you being a little dramatic, talking basketball?"

Lisa sighed. "Well, dinner's in the dining room." Before she even reached the entrance to the dining room, Homer had started another game.

"I'll fit you! I'll fit you good, square block!"

"Well?" Marge inquired, as Lisa sat down and took a large bite of her tofu burger.

"I tried," Lisa said. "He looks kinda doped up—on Tetris."

Marge gave her characteristic grumble. "Well, he has to stop sometime! He'll be asleep by nine o'clock. He hasn't missed bedtime for ten months—even when those escaped criminals tried to rob us."

But nine o'clock passed…ten o'clock…eleven o'clock…

At one a.m., Marge woke up to get a glass of water. To her amazement and shock, Homer was _not in bed!_

But then…

"WHOO HOOO! I'm at Level Five at last! I'm number one! I'm number one!"

Marge rolled her eyes and went downstairs; Bart and Lisa came into the hallway, blinking sleepily in the hallway lights.

"What's going on?" Lisa asked idly.

"Let's go downstairs and find out!" Bart exclaimed. "To the first floor!"

Brother and sister raced downstairs, just as Homer started yelling again.

"What happened? It's not saving my points! It's going really slow! Marge, kids! Call the police."

"Now, Homey," Marge said calmly and firmly, "I'm sure it'll save your points…"

"Press this key, Dad!" Bart exclaimed.

"No!" Lisa said. "That will-," But it was too late.

Homer began to sob. "It shut down the computer! Now my score is lost! Whhhy? This is the worst trauma ever!"

"There, there, Homey," Marge said slowly, "There will always be another game."

"No, there won't!" Homer shouted. "It betrayed me! The whole computer betrayed me because it shut down when I pressed the Shut Down button! I'll smash it to Hell!"

Homer grabbed the chair and prepared to smash the computer and the monitor. It took Marge, Bart and Lisa to pull him down to the floor, where Homer finally sat down and continued to sob. The other three looked at each other uneasily, but finally Homer stood up, sniffling, and took a deep breath.

"I guess my attempts at playing electronic games is over. Asteroids, Pac-Man, they all crushed me."

"Let's all go back to bed. I'm surprised Maggie didn't wake…wait, where _is_ Maggie? She wasn't in her high chair at dinner tonight, but I didn't notice! Oh, I'm an awful mother!"

"Er…it's partly my fault, Marge. I was supposed to be watching her, but she was distracting me from Tetris. I left her in the closet in our room with the cat and the dog. They were distracting, too."

"Oh, my Lord!" Marge gasped. "My poor traumatized baby!"

She raced upstairs, ran into their room, and flung open the closet door.

Maggie was sound asleep, curled up with the cat and dog.

Everything always comes out right in the end…until the next crazy Simpson adventure.


	2. A Rat Named Lisa

It was another day at Springfield Elementary. Lisa Simpson jumped off of the somewhat decrepit school bus and swung her backpack onto her shoulders.

"Thanks, Otto!" she called to the bus driver.

"No problem! Rock on, students!" he shouted as the doors of the bus closed.

Lisa hurried into school, dodging the slower students . Bart was far behind, trying to impress Jimbo, Dolph, Kearney and Nelson by hooking his right leg over his left hand and hopping backwards—or at least trying to. This resulted in an embarrassing crash to the ground. Even Milhouse laughed, and each bully punched Bart and laughed.

While Bart was wobbling up from the ground, Lisa was turning her locker combination. The padlock clicked open. From her locker, Lisa pulled out the two books she would need for her morning classes: _A Short History of Springfield_ and _The Elements of Style: 21__st__ Century Edition._

History class was painfully dry and boring, even for Lisa. After the "Jebediah Springfield years", Springfield was not much in the way of time-changing history. And Ralph kept interrupting, always asking the same question.

"Miss Hoover? What state are we in? There are lots of Springfields in the United Rakes!"

"United _States_, Ralph. And _this _Springfield is in the same state I told you the first ten times, Ralph," Ms. Hoover sighed in exasperation.

"I'm sorry," Ralph whimpered.

English class was next. Mr. Barker, a newly hired teacher, started the class with the confidence of one with the confidence of one who had not worked at Springfield Elementary for long.

"The real spelling of 'see you later' is _not_ C-u-l-, number eight, -t-r. It's 's-e-e', 'y-o-u', 'l-a-t-e-r," Mr. Barker cheerfully explained early in the class. Several of the kids grumbled or rolled their eyes. Sherri, who texted almost constantly, raised her hand. Mr. Barkley nodded. "What do you have to say, Sherri?"

"That takes too long!" Sherri proclaimed. Mr. Barker was starting to lose a little of his perky demeanor. "Doesn't anyone want to spell right?"

There was silence; not even Lisa answered, as it really was an empty question. With a sigh of frustration, Mr. Barker slammed the teacher's edition of his book shut and tiredly allowed the students to leave. Lisa and the other students hurried to the cafeteria.

Sitting at her usual place, Lisa opened her lunchbox and took out seaweed crackers a Tupperware bowl of tomato soup, and for desser- a Hostperson Brand brownie?

"Aww, Mom got my organic brownie mixed up with Dad's brownies," Lisa moaned. "These are made with extra cow grease to make them easier to chew."

"Hostperson brand? I thought it was Hostess brand," Janie said, sitting down across from Lisa.

"It was, but then a group of feminists told the company that Hostess it was sexist and threatened to sue."

"Look, there's a joke on the wrapper," Janie pointed out. "'are you sugar you like brownies'?" she read. She rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, cheap joke," Lisa said. "Hey, I bet Ralph would think it's funny, and he likes anything sugary. I think I'll give him the brownie. He needs cheering up after Jimbo filled his locker with bacon grease yesterday."

"Why did Jimbo do that?"

"Ralph accidentally tripped Jimbo when everyone was in recess yesterday. Jimbo fell into Groundskeeper Willy's manure pile," Lisa explained.

"Why is the manure in the schoolyard anyway?" Janie asked, but Lisa was already walking off to give her brownie to Ralph. But Ralph wasn't anywhere, not even at the table in the farthest corner, where he usually sat when he was feeling sad.  
>"That's odd," Lisa said to herself. "I guess he's in the bathroom."<p>

Then she noticed a blob of dried glue near the cafeteria door. Bits of dried glue led out of the cafeteria and into the hall. Curious, Lisa followed these bits of glue, which continued into Principal Skinner's empty office. Or so Lisa thought it was empty, but when she peered in, she gasped.

_Ralph Wiggum was putting pins all over Principal Skinner's chair and he had glued the intercom set to the floor!_

Lisa crept back out, peering through the office window. Ralph had not noticed her, but what could she do? Poor Ralph suffered so much at the hands of his fellow students and even school staff! Why make it worse? On the other hand, he was breaking a school rule…Lisa frowned at the conflict in her own mind. Then she thought of something—if she didn't say anything, Bart might be blamed! He was a teasing, annoying boy, at times (many times, Lisa admitted) but he shouldn't be blamed for something he didn't do. And this prank certainly looked much like the work of Bart Simpson. But it wasn't.

"Hi, Lisa! Principal Skinner isn't here. He's eating lunch. I made Principal Skinner's chair all prickly!"

Lisa jumped as Ralph appeared before her, with his usually innocent, naïve smile on his face.

"Why, Ralph?" she managed to say.

"Because the cool kids do it. I want to be cool."

Lisa could not think of anything to say. Automatically, handed Ralph the brownie and told him that she had to get to geography class (which began in twenty minutes).

It was just before the end of school that Lisa managed to talk to Principal Skinner at his office. When she arrived, Seymour Skinner was meticulously pulling the pins out of his chair.

"Principal Skinner?" Lisa asked hesitantly, walking into the office like a nervous cat.

"Oh, Lisa, it's you! Look what happened to my chair? And my microphone!" Seymour Skinner said sharply. "One of the school troublemakers did it. And I'll bet my mother upon it that it was Bart!"

"But it wasn't Bart!" Lisa gasped. "It was…it was…Ralph Wiggum!"

Mr. Skinner chuckled scornfully. "Ralph Wiggum? He'd no sooner do this than stop eating paste!"

"No, it's true. He wasn't at lunch. And then I saw glue flakes going out the hall and all the way to your office. It was glue flakes that fell from the glue from his shirt. He's always getting glue on his shirt."

"Maybe Bart did that to throw me off."

"No," Lisa begged. "You have to believe me. You know I don't lie, and…" Her eyes spotted something near Skinner's desk. Slipping forward, she grabbed something small and blue.

"It's one of the earplugs that Ralph wears so he can't stick his finger in his ear!" Lisa flung it off onto the desk; it was full of earwax.

"You're right, Lisa," Skinner admitted. "I know Bart wouldn't have one of those, even if he wanted to hide his trail. These earplugs were given to Ralph especially, by his doctor."

"Oh," Lisa said, relieved that Bart would not be blamed for this prank.

"Now, Lisa, I'll certainly get to Ralph about this. I won't mention you," Principal Skinner told her.

"But he knows I was the only one around when it happened," Lisa objected.

"I'll tell him I found the evidence in my office—which _is_ true."

Lisa looked relieved, wondering why she hadn't thought of that. "_Please, please_ don't forget not to mention me."

Then Lisa ran down the hall, out of school, and onto the bus. Ralph was standing in the middle of the aisle, but he slipped into the empty seat next to Lisa just as the latter sat down.

"Thank you for the brownie, Lisa. It was good. Are you sugar you didn't want it?" Ralph giggled. Lisa groaned—she knew she'd be hearing different variations of the joke all week.

"That prank sure was funny!" Ralph said happily.

"Sshh!" Lisa whispered. To pacify Ralph and trick him into thinking she had no part in his eventual punishment, she continued, "Be quiet. You don't want someone to find out what you did, do you? It's funnier if they can't figure it out."

Ralph agreed happily. He looked so innocent and simple-minded that she felt a prickle of pity for him. Yet in her heart, she thought that she had done right.

The next day was Thursday. On the surface, it was the usual routine at school; two classes in the morning, lunch, three classes after that, and then Physical Education. As with any daily routine, however, it was not completely fixed. Things happened as, always, to break "the petty pace of day".

Jimbo tricked Milhouse into eating a candy bar with Tabasco sauce on it. Janie was late to English because she had been trying to catch the attention of an older boy as he walked down the hall. Bart had hidden Mrs. Krabappel's laser pointer.

And Ralph tripped Lisa as she was walking to math class.

Lisa was just wandering along amiably, her book in hand, thinking of her upcoming history test. She was passing by Ralph when—_WHAM!_-Lisa and her book went sprawling. Lisa looked rather dazed as she stood up. She stumbled to her feet, and only then she realized that Ralph was laughing!

"That was funny!" Ralph squeaked.

"Ralph, did _you_ trip me?" Lisa gasped.

"You told Principal Skinner what I did!"

"What do you mean? You don't think I'd tattle on you, do you?" she answered evasively.

"Principal Skinner made me write all over the chalkboard. 'I will not waste pins and glue,'" Ralph told her in an injured voice. "Then he said, 'Now, I want you to understand this. Lisa asked me not to tell you she did it, because…' and then he said a bad word and told me to forget what he said."

A shocked Lisa turned on her heel and rushed down the hall. She violently burst into math class, panting from the effort. Ms. Hoover looked at her in disapproval.

"Well, I'm glad you decided to join us, now that we're halfway through class," she scolded. The other children dutifully giggled.

"Sorry, Miss Hoover," Lisa murmured. She was relieved to be in class—after the incident with Ralph, she was glad that she would be away from him for a short time.

Lisa was at home just an hour later, and she'd never been gladder to leave school. Ralph had glared at her as she stepped on the bus, and she hated the tight tension. Lisa had never thought that Ralph could be so harsh. The prank, too, had been clever—at least when compared to "Ralph's one-donut-short-of a dozen intelligence", as Homer called it.

Coming into the house with Bart, she saw her father on the couch watching ESPN and shoving pork rinds into his mouth. Maggie was trying to get his beer, and Marge was working frantically to get ready for Patty and Selma's visit that night; Selma had gotten engaged. Again. To Mayor Quimby!

Bart went into the fridge for some cupcakes, and Lisa flung herself into the recliner. Her head swam with thoughts as she tried to organize in her mind what had happened between her and Ralph.

On Monday, Lisa decided not to take any notice of Ralph at all. If she didn't keep defending herself, he might eventually come to terms with the fact that she had "ratted" on him to the principal. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction of responding to his

Lisa and Ralph had geography and English class together; they passed in the hall; and of course, they were both at the cafeteria for lunch. Lisa didn't say a word as they entered the cafeteria together and nothing happened.

That is, until Lisa was unwrapping her meatless burger during lunch…

"Lisa, look out!" Janie cried. A confused Lisa looked in every direction.

_SPLAT!_

Lisa jumped and wiped her face. A big sandwich had been thrown in her face! Mayonnaise was dripping down her face, and one half of the sandwich, covered with mustard, lay in her lap! She looked at Bart, but he was talking to friends. Glancing around once more, she saw Ralph at a nearby table, with a grin on his face and an empty plate in one hand.

_Calm down, Lisa, _she thought. _Don't get upset, or he'll win. But this is so not like Ralph! I must've really hurt him. But I did what I thought was right. And I need to get the mustard and mayonnaise off._

A grudging Lunchlady Doris assisted Lisa to the kitchen, where she wiped clean her dress and face. Her dress was a damp, slightly stained mess, but she tried not to think about it.

Even the most determined people have their limits. The next day, when Ralph wrote "Lisa is crazy about Ralph!" on _her_ locker, she'd had it. Those words reminded of the day when Ralph had dated her (even though _she _hadn't wanted to date him). Lisa had accidentally hurt his feelings. They'd made up in the end, but Lisa still felt the same way about Ralph—a good friend, and that was all.

"I'm not crazy about Ralph!" she muttered to herself, just as Sandra, one of the stuck-up, boy-crazy, meat-chomping girls in school, passed Lisa's locker. Sandra laughed and pointed the message out to a girl walking beside her. They both giggled and whispered something. All Lisa could hear was, "Crazy…dumb…match…goody-girl…funny."

Lisa was finally fed up. At the end of the day, as she gathered her books and lunchbox from her locker, she encountered Ralph. Grinning slyly, she slipped something out of her backpack. It was a water balloon filled with jelly. Waiting until Ralph had his back turned, she threw it precisely at his back.

_SPLAT!_ It hit square in Ralph's back and dripped down his clothes. Ralph whirled, and suddenly Lisa felt a flicker of shame. To her great surprise, however, Ralph was laughing!

"That's funny, Lisa! I wanted to see if you got mad at me!" Ralph shouted.

"Huh?" Lisa said blankly.

"At first I wanted you to feel bad because you told what I did. But then I thought it would be fun to see if you got mad. Everyone says you are a…a…poormat…I didn't think you were a poormat."

"Doormat," Lisa corrected.

"Ok. But I knew 'doormat' was something bad."

Lisa smiled. "C'mon. I'll help you get cleaned up."


	3. The Ten Bartmandments

"But the most important thing to remember is that God is love. No one can love without God. Love is important to humans, and, as the Bible says, love is the greatest. It is the greatest because God gave love to humans. What is love? Nobody really understands, but through God they realize the essentials. This is possible because God is love…"

The laypersons of the First Church of Springfield had were in a half-awake stupor—all except for Ned Flanders and his sons, of course. Sighing, the reverend finished his sermon.

"…and so we come to the conclusion: love is all. Amen. Church is dismissed."

The attendants at the church awoke instantly, just as a bored, half-asleep dog hears food pouring into a dish and instantly awakens. The congregation started to stand up, but Reverend Lovejoy suddenly spoke.

"Now that you're all awake, I have one more thing to say."

"Oh yeah?" Homer shouted as the others sat down reluctantly. "What are you gonna do about it if we all leave?"

"I'll make the next sermon more bor—er, longer!" Lovejoy shouted back.

"Every week, a member of the Sunday School will be asked to give a little sermon to show how much they love God. You may now go."

"That's it?" Moe complained as everyone started to leave again. "I could've been well on the way to the adult video store by now!"

As the Simpsons drove home, Bart started to complain having to do a sermon. As he used a good many swear words, Marge turned in her seat so that she was facing the kids. She reprimanded Bart, but he didn't seem to care; he just continued to keep complaining.

"Can't I go Buddhist for awhile?" Bart asked no one in particular. "Just long enough to be safe from having to preach on some overrated Biblical stuff?"

Both Marge and Lisa were insulted.

"Bart, you can't go into the Buddhist religion with such flippancy. And you can't use it as some devious escape from the religion you are already in!" Lisa gasped.

"It is not overrated. The Bible has helped save many lives. It is meaningful to many," Marge told Bart severely. "Homer, do you have anything to say to Bart?"

"Bart, do what your mother says about church," Homer answered absentmindedly. Of course, he hadn't really listened to the conversation. Marge grumbled all the way home.

Meanwhile, back at the church, an outraged Sunday school teacher was ranting to Timothy Lovejoy. Ms. Albright was frantically trying to convince the preacher that having Bart do a sermon would be a sin in the eyes of God.

"You don't know how insane he is in his understanding. He doesn't really seem to care about Church, but he is irreverent. Thinks of what he would say! Last week he asked if there were pork chops in hell—'in case my dad goes there,' he said."

"Yes," Lovejoy half-agreed, "but if I cut out Bart, I might be accused of favoritism."

Ms. Albright sighed, seeing that Timothy Lovejoy wasn't going to budge on this issue.

"Well, ask every kid if he or she _wants_ to 'preach'" Ms. Albright suggested as she stomped off.

"But what too many don't want to? Then I'll have to preach the sermons!" Reverend Lovejoy shouted after her, but Ms. Albright had disappeared.

At the next Sunday school session, Ms. Albright asked each student if they _wanted_ to volunteer to read their own sermon. Rod and Todd eagerly raised their hands and agreed. All of the other students, excluding Bart and a girl who was new to town, also agreed, rather reluctantly. They didn't want to be reprimanded.

"Very good," Ms. Albright smiled, relieved that Bart wasn't going to give a sermon.

"Ms Albright, will Reverend Lovejoy still preach, even if a kid does?" Todd Flanders asked worriedly.

"No, the sermons are just for the kids the next few weeks."

"Aww, nuts," Todd muttered, and then frantically apologized to God. "I'm sorry, Mr. God! I didn't mean to swear! But it just won't be Sunday without Mr. Lovejoy's sermon!"

Bart suddenly realized that if a kid gave the sermon, there would be no dry, bland sermon from Reverend Lovejoy—and hopefully, it would be shorter! Pretending to be sweet and innocent, Bart raised his hand. "Ms. Albright?"

"Yes, Bart?" Ms. Albright sighed.

"I decided I want to give a sermon," Bart said sweetly. "Todd made me think of how important a good sermon is!"

Ms. Albright fell furious. She knew Bart's sudden change of mind was a put-on, but she couldn't do anything. The Reverend had told her that any kid who agreed to preach _had_ to preach. She felt like strangling Todd, though in her heart she knew that he hadn't spoken with malice aforethought.

For the next few weeks, every child gave a sermon on Sunday. Some were boring, some were on the verge of irreverence but not quite, some were funny, and some were fairly good. Todd (and Rodd too, when his turn came), gave a Lovejoy-ish sermon. Ralph's sermon was about how Heaven was filled with milk and honey and that everyone in Heaven would have to swim through it. Milhouse gave a sermon on evil—haphazardly using the bullies at Springfield Elementary as examples of evil. The bullies didn't attend church* but they heard about the sermon and beat Milhouse up the following Monday.

And then it was Bart's turn to preach.

"Now, the following isn't my belief. Probably because I don't have any beliefs," Bart began. Reverend Lovejoy sighed in disgust and the Flanders gasped in horror.

"I should've baptized Bart, despite a raging Homer," Mr. Flanders said to Rod and Todd. Bart was continuing his sermon when Mr. Flanders reluctantly turned his attention back to the sermon.

"Good people will go to Heaven, they say," Bart continued. Now, based on what I've learned about Heaven, you live forever in happiness with God. That sounds awful to me. Think about it. What if you had to eat M&Ms forever? It might be nice at first, but then you'd get sick of it. So that's that. Amen."

"Oh, Lord," groaned a horrified Timothy Lovejoy. "I knew it would go wrong."

Ms. Albright was a little more charitable. "Well, he didn't talk about zombies in Heaven or how the Catholic church is 'cool' because men have most of the power."

Reverend Lovejoy laughed pessimistically. "_Every _Catholic has to walk on eggshells lest they fall from the rigid conformity. But I don't judge the Catholics—that's for vengeful God to do."

Ms. Albright laughed. "I thought we were talking about Bart's so-called sermon."

Reverend Lovejoy threw up his hand and sighed. "Not much to discuss. I'm sort of fed up with everything having to do with church right now. I'm going to relax in my squishy recliner with M&Ms and watch _Futurama."_


End file.
